If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You will have to register
and introduce yourself in the Introductions forum before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Re: Beta- Footy Design Plan Review

Chad -

just an opinion - be careful of how you list this forum addition - since the word "plan" can have many meanings to a lot of people....... mostly based on experience. The following IS NOT related to only the FOOTY Class !

I can probably step in, and using a top, side, front view of a boat - be able to pull off the lines needed. Someone else may only need the lines and their experience provides them the opportunity to build the boat. Others may need the line drawings, and perhaps station shadows/templates, while others yet again may need not only the photo, drawings, templates - but also the written "step-by-step" text. Finally there are some who, provided with ALL of this information, can hardly make it through a plastic kit assembly.

TomoHawk - While a bill of materials needed may be helpful, any associated costs are likely to change, as are construction techniques. To try to tell someone how to build a boat, will generate all numbers of responses, making the process even more confusing, and thereby intimidating, no matter how difficult it really is. Just look at any forum topic in general and you will see the wide variety of opinions. Insert a "newbie" into this and I don't think it will be helpful - just confusing.

Chad, I would recommend an agreement among subscribers, that they can post of plans in whatever their format, having the poster give a brief overview of what is included/not included in the plans, and a way the potential builder can contact the poster and they can deal one-on-one with "HOW" to build. To try to go beyond that is more than most plan services can do - and that's their specialty.

Thus I would see .......

CLASS
DESIGN NAME
LINK TO PLAN
POSTER'S NAME/METHOD OF CONTACT
DESCRIPTION OF PLAN

This would provide as much info as needed by potential builder to decide - and eliminate discussion. There are plenty of provided "discussion" capabilities in your forum, so keeping this one to a "Post Only - No Reply" should be considered.

Again - only my opinion if you proceed to open for all classes of boats - great idea by the way !

Re: Beta- Footy Design Plan Review

For most of the plans I have, you only get the templates for the hull panels, and some basic instruction on how to assemble it was somewhere in the Footy section. Except for a few extra things like measurements for the mast and keel location, keel & rudder dimentions, etc. The rest is left up to the builder. All the rest of the innards, like the keel supports, servo mounts, radio placement, etc. is left up to the builder too, and that's also part of the Footy experience.

FlatFoot is a very basic "plan" if you would call it that. It was just a picture of the card template before trimming with measurements marked on it, which was the designer's goal. We discussed how the hull should look when you add the reinforcements, and that was it. Obviously it requires more effort to build than other designs.

Flatfoot obviously isn't aimed at the real beginner like Bobabout is. So including a comment about the build difficulty or experience needed, like Bill said, to build when submitting your plan is a very good idea.

Even though the Footy class has a basic hull design, equipment, finish, etc., a "real newbie" could still find it difficult to build one, depending on which one it is. Hopefully those people will not get discouraged and instead get on their computers and read up on all the comments people posted in stead of giving up. I also hope that these people have someone who can advise them. When you submit your plan, add a comment urging anyone with difficulty to contact you or read the associated comments, or even put some links or pointers to documents relative to the build, and make it stand out with bold-face or large font, or whatever you like.